


A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes

by bottledspirits



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Rumbelle Secret Santa 2013
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-20
Updated: 2014-12-20
Packaged: 2018-03-02 12:53:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2812712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bottledspirits/pseuds/bottledspirits
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Belle explores the castle library, as well as her master's patience.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes

**Author's Note:**

> Can't believe I neglected to cross post this here. This was my 2013 RSS for lyssana11. Have at it!

Belle didn’t know the books in the library were enchanted until she chanced to open one.

She’d spent several minutes poring over an old volume she meant to dust, an account of the adventures of a daring knight who had lived centuries earlier. Belle was flipping through tales of sword fights and fearsome beasts when she came upon an illustration of an armor-clad man astride a great white horse. His sword was drawn, aimed at the heavens. The sun burst from the clouds behind him, gleaming off his polished suit, and his horse reared high into the air.

 _Ridiculous_ , Belle thought. What kind of hero had the time to polish all that armor? And that poor horse, forced to carry such a heavy burden. The man who could walk under that suit must have weighed hundreds of pounds alone. Would such a man really be an effective fighter? Brutal, perhaps, and certainly strong, but what was brute strength against a clever mind?

As she thought this, the picture began to move. Belle gripped the book tight in both hands and stared, eyes wide. The great horse kicked its massive feet as if in warning, the bold knight swung his blade in the direction of the sunset, and the pair rode off in a cloud of dust and crimson sunbursts. She watched until the horse and its rider were nothing but a speck on the page and the vivid sky faded into darker and darker hues until it was if someone had dipped the page in ink. Her breath caught as she watched the first flickering star appear on that fantastic horizon.

A curious urge struck her. Belle flipped to the next page in the book, glanced at the columns of dense text, and then turned the page back. The horse and rider had returned, as lifeless and still as when she’d first set eyes on them. There was no sign of the display Belle had witnessed.

And yet the image of that lone twinkling star against the ebony firmament stuck in her mind. She leafed through the book until she found the next illustration. The gallant knight had left his horse and was doing battle with a mighty dragon. Tall as a house and covered in gleaming black scales, the creature loomed over the knight with fangs bared and yellow eyes narrowed in the most sinister expression she had ever seen. The artist had taken pains to portray the beast all sharp angles and jagged points, but despite this, Belle could not help but admire the elegance of the lines, the flowing form of the creature that dominated the page.

By comparison, the shining figure of the knight who stood backed into a corner, sword lost, was but a flicker against the ocean of black that was the beast. She admired the man’s courage, yet when she looked upon the monster, as terrible as it was beautiful, Belle was glad that here, at least, they could do each other no harm, locked in time as they were.

The thought had barely crossed her mind when the book sprang to life once more. Belle was prepared this time, but could not help the gasp that escaped her lips. The man was truly cornered. His blade lay at his feet as he stared ahead, frozen. The dragon reared up like a storm-cloud. A light flared among those impossibly sharp teeth. The beast raised one taloned claw and raked at the side of the cave where the two stood, loosing great shards of rock as it left four deep gouges in its wake. Its breath surged, grew bright and hot – Belle almost felt the warmth emanate from the page – and a column of fire rushed toward the knight.  
But the man ducked at the last moment, rolled forward and caught his sword with one hand as he lunged straight for the beast. The creature turned, lashing at the wall once more with its claws, and its enormous bulk obscured the page. Belle found herself staring at a canvas of black once more.

She closed the book with a snap, feeling as breathless as if she had just fought a dragon herself. She could not contain herself any longer. Leaving behind duster and rags, Belle rose from where she had settled on the floor and raced for the stairs with the book tucked under her arm. She practically skipped down the corridor as she approached the nearest neighbor of her tower hideaway.

Rumplestiltskin was at his vials as usual. He did not look up immediately when she mounted the last step, though his eyes darted in her direction before he studiously returned to pouring a minute amount of green liquid into a flask of white powder.

His composure made her remember herself. Belle halted a few yards away from the wizard and took a moment to collect herself, smoothing mussed skirts and flown-away hair, but could not dim the brightness in her eyes. When Rumplestiltskin finally set down his potions and looked up, she was clutching the book to her chest and beaming at him.

“Yes?” he asked. His tone was sedate, as it tended to be when he’d been working for some time, but it was the tone that struck her – low, as far from the impish twitter as she’d ever heard it – and his eyes were calm.

The way he paused when she entered, the way he casually set down his instruments when he saw her…he was not bothered in the least by her presence.

But he was looking at her with a puzzled expression, brows furrowed. He had not been expecting her. He had no idea why she was there.

“I…I was just thinking it might be nice to have tea soon,” Belle said, deflated.

“I see,” Rumplestiltskin said. He turned back to his work and did not meet her eye. “As you wish.”

Belle licked her lip before she could catch herself.

“I-I’ll just be downstairs, then,” she said. He nodded and made no move to stop her.

She backed toward the stairs, book held to her stomach, and watched him. The sky was growing dark, and he had but one candle on his table. In that fickle light he looked almost – almost – like a picture himself.

He did not hear her slowly let out the breath she had been holding. Nor did she see how, when the rustle of her skirts and the clack of her heels faded from the tower, Rumplestiltskin reached down with both hands and gripped the edge of the table as if in fear of falling.

Her pace slowed as she reached the bottom of the stairs. So it hadn’t been his doing. She had thought for a moment…

Belle stopped. The pictures hadn’t been his doing. Was the magic in the book itself, then?

And if there was one enchanted book…were there others?  
The grin had returned to Belle’s face. She would comb every inch of that library. Before, the thought of so many books had excited her. Now she was thrilled.

He had given her a magic library. More books than she could read in a lifetime, and as full of magic as the man himself. Belle hopped down the last steps and skipped to the kitchen to prepare the tea before dinner, humming as she went. She hadn’t been this excited for a long time.

That evening, Rumplestiltskin watched her over his teacup with a bemused look. Belle hummed lightly as she moved about the table, grinned at him when she caught him looking, swirled around with the tray as if its weight was nothing to her.

There was no time to read that night, or the next morning, but as soon as she had a free moment, Belle slipped up to the library and settled on the sofa with the book from yesterday. She opened on a random illustration. The brave knight was calling up to the tower of a maiden who had been trapped by a terrible curse. She could only be freed if the knight fought through a forest of thorns and found the one rose that bloomed there.

And it was a lovely thing, that rose. It nearly shone on the page, a vivid red against a backdrop of dark brambles and shadows. Belle stared at it for a long time before she remembered herself and closed the book. She was just putting it up for the day when a thought struck her. She took it down once more and skimmed to the passage of the knight’s battle with the dragon.

It did not go into much detail, except to say “It was slain.” That did not surprise her. But she was horrified to read what happened after.

The knight cut off the head of the dragon and presented it to his lord as tribute. It was mounted on a pike and carried through the streets, where people cheered and tossed flowers at the feet of the bearer.

Belle closed the book with a sick feeling. It was a fearsome beast, certainly, but surely no creature deserved to be treated in that way? To be paraded and reviled like some blight upon the world…

It had only acted to defend itself. Wasn’t that the nature of a beast – the nature of all beasts? A dragon was not the only creature who hoarded what was precious and bared its fangs at the world.

Perhaps she had chosen the wrong book, Belle decided. Adventure was all well and good, but there had to be one hero who didn’t bear a blade and cut down every obstacle in their path. A hero whose heart was as true as their course would be enough for her.

She rummaged through the shelves for a while before she came across the chronicle of a traveling bard. Not much slaying to be had there, she reasoned. Belle dropped onto the sofa and cracked open the book.

It was a journal, she realized. The pages were yellow and crackly and covered in a slanted script. She could feel the cotton binding coming loose. Belle had to hold it delicately to keep it from falling apart entirely.

She wondered how it had come to rest among volumes of bound leather and gold leaf. It was a humble thing by comparison. She liked it all the more for that. There was a faint smell of straw in the pages, as if the owner had spent a great deal of time sleeping in hay lofts or riding in clattering farmers’ carts. Belle rather liked the image.

As she read, she found the bard was educated, but no scribe; he wrote in a coarse script and an unaffected prose that was surprisingly entertaining. He wrote of the people he encountered and the mishaps he experienced on his journey to become a famous singer in the capital. His descriptions of people were unflinchingly honest, and all the more hilarious for it. There was one woman in particular, the wife of a well-to-do innkeeper, who had turned up her nose at the sight of him, yet that night she appeared in his room clad in a sheer silk gown and tried to seduce him. He had been in the middle of politely refusing when she made an attempt to grab his hand, and in so doing, her luscious chestnut locks had slid from her head and fallen to the floor with a plop.

Belle tried not to laugh over this. It was just so absurd. But the poor woman!

It turned out the haughty innkeeper’s wife had once dreamed of becoming an opera singer before her father forced her to marry an up-and-coming landlord in the town. She had found some happiness in the life of a busy innkeeper, but every time she saw a musician, her heart longed for that dream, and each time she was reminded of what a wretched, arrogant thing she had become.

The bard listened while she poured out her heart. He was surprised by her attentions to him, for he confessed he was by no means handsome, and the misery of a fellow creature tugged at his sympathies.

While he could not be her second youth, he promised to write a song in her name; for a soul that could love could not be so bad after all.

And the song was recorded in the book. It was written in a hasty hand, with parts scratched out and new ones scribbled in. Evidently the bard’s thoughts were more rapid than his pen.

It was a light-hearted tune, in places as absurd as the event that inspired it. The lyrics were somewhat clumsy, as if the writer had not yet mastered his technique. Yet for all this, there was warmth in the words, and Belle smiled.

She ran a finger fondly down the page and jumped when a voice sprang up from nowhere. The voice belonged to a male, rich if somewhat warbled, with the slightest trace of an accent. Belle sat up and looked around, but there was no one but herself. She cast a quizzical look at the book. It sat in her lap innocently, as if asking what she could be so bothered by.

But that voice…those words…they were the exact words that appeared in that book. It was the first voice she had heard, apart from Rumplestiltskin’s and her own, in many weeks. She held the book to her chest and cradled it there until the unseen singer finished the song and lapsed into silence.

Every day after, Belle opened the book and listened to a song. It was not just the sound she craved. Someone, somewhere, had held this book long ago, and in holding it herself she felt a kind of kinship. The songs of the bard were sometimes hopeful, at other times lively and spirited, and a rare few contained the melancholy of the lone traveler. But this man had lived his dream, had had adventures, and that was something she would never do.

Belle found many surprises among those shelves. She was careful not to neglect her work, but spent hours curled on the sofa or stretched out on the floor with a book in her lap, as fascinated by the worlds they contained as the magic that sprang from their covers.

Rumplestiltskin must have noticed the time she spent in the library, though he didn’t mention it. He didn’t mention much of anything if he could avoid it. He was always so careful and grave around her. It was a great change from when she’d first arrived. He’d been this giggling, prancing creature, making silly quips and finding something to smirk at in everything. She missed his good humor.

When he discovered her leafing through a book of poetry that conjured the scent of the flowers described in the passages, she was damp-eyed and sniffling. He’d looked alarmed and stood at a distance to ask what was the matter. Belle had looked up to him, eyes shining, and said she’d never read such a wonderful thing in her life.

He was even more puzzled by that. She could see it in the way his brow furrowed and his eyes narrowed every so slightly. He kept his hands behind his back, and she suspected he was twirling his fingers in that absent way he thought she didn’t notice. Or was he even aware of it himself?

Belle turned her head to examine him more closely. The afternoon sun that blazed through the windows softened the jagged edges of his leather jacket. It shone through the dusty curls that brushed his shoulders, and even his eyes, normally so inhumanly cat-like, had a less hunted look in that gentle light.

Rumplestiltskin grew uneasy under her gaze and moved to turn away.

“Well, as long as you’re…as long as you enjoy yourself,” the wizard mumbled as he made to leave. He did not meet her eye.

It was only when he was well down the stairs that she realized he had not told her why he had sought her out in the first place.

They continued this routine for several weeks. Somewhere in that time, she had begun to feel the absence of something. She searched for it on the shelves, even leafed through books she had already devoured to see if there was a trace she had overlooked, but it was no good.

It wasn’t anything she expected to find. Belle had never much been interested in it at home, though she had always supposed, with a different setting and temperament, she might have been. Still, it seemed strange that not one book in her library could afford to satisfy her interest.

Belle decided to ask Rumplestiltskin directly. She took a basket of straw to his tower as an excuse. It was something she did more and more these days, as much to see the muted surprise on his face as to have a reason to climb the dusty stone steps to the tower.

He made no notice of her as she entered. She walked straight to his table and set the basket down in the center of the rabble. He looked up, startled, and she gave him a demure grin.

“Good morning,” Belle said.

His lips twitched with apparent irritation.

“Hmm,” he grunted as he turned his attention back to the pages of a heavy tome crowded with symbols in no language she had ever seen before.

But his manner did not ruffle her in the least. Belle placed her hands on the table and leaned forward, inhaling the scent of straw.

“I’ve been meaning to ask you something,” she confessed, eyes trained on his as they trailed across a page.

Rumplestiltskin glanced up once more, lips drawn in a resigned expression.

“Yes?” he asked. There was a tone in his voice that warned her a quip was not far off. She had caught him in an ill mood, it seemed.

Belle took guard in audacity. She cocked her head and returned his impatient expression with a sly grin.

“There’s no romance in your library,” Belle chirped.

“ _What?_ ” he sputtered. He jerked his hands away from the table and stumbled back as if she might bite him.

Belle’s smile did not flicker.

“I mean, I didn’t expect tawdry accounts of affairs and debauchery, but a ballad or two wouldn’t be out of the question, would they?” she asked, picture of innocence.

Rumplestiltskin grew more uncomfortable as she spoke. He choked at the word ‘debauchery’ – surely he’d seen a bit of that in his time? - and at the mention of ballads he wrinkled his nose.

“What use do I have for those?” he said nastily.

She turned her head to gaze coyly at him across her curls.

“You have no interest in it, then? Romance, I mean,” she added when he made no answer.

“No,” he said flatly, turning back to his book and taking no further leave of her.

Belle watched him for a moment, and her smile turned sad.

“I see,” she said.

She turned and left the tower without another word. He did not stop her. But this time, as the sound of her footsteps faded, the Dark One reached a hand to the table where he stood and dragged his nails across the wood, as if trying to claw away at some persistent thought. He left four thin grooves in his wake.

Belle went to her library with a heavy heart that day. She had not known that she sought romance until there seemed no chance of finding it. He had been so kind to her these last months, in his own way. Anyone else might not have seen it, but the longer she knew him, the longer Belle grew to learn to understand his ways. Expressing a sentiment through a quiet word, an unspoken thought by hovering at her side; he had a gentle presence, for all he was supposed to be so terrible, and she had thought…

She paused as she climbed the last step. Had he never felt the joy of a book? The happiness of the hero’s triumph, the pity for the lonely traveler caught in the gale, or the strange, quiet feeling that stole over her as the poet described a scene one would think could never have been caught into words? Why have so many of these things if he was only interested in potents and spells?

Belle skimmed the shelves with no real interest. She brushed her fingers across the bindings as she walked the arc of the tower, lost in thought. Did he truly have no interest in…

She paused. Her hand had drifted from smooth leather to something coarse.

Frowning, Belle turned and found a slim, cloth-bound volume tucked between two massive tomes. She had never seen it before. It certainly seemed an odd place for it to appear.

She lifted it from the shelf with cautious fingers. The cover might have once been a brilliant shade of red, but had faded over time to a muted pink. The pages were dusty when she opened them – impossibly so. She’d never encountered so much dust in a book before. Belle squinted and fanned the grime away with hand. So surprised was she that she did not notice the way the dust shimmered in the light.

She settled on the sofa with the book, coughing lightly. There was a strange burning in her lungs. Belle paid it little mind as she brushed through the acknowledgments. The book was printed in a heavy type she had seen in the books sold at her father’s markets. This was not like the books in her library, not even the bard’s journal. It had been printed and sold to suit the means and tastes of the common class.

Her eyes fell to the title of the first chapter: “There Was a Light.” She frowned and read on.

It was a fairy story, as she had heard them called, though fairies did not always appear in them. This was the tale of a wandering princess. She had run away from an overbearing father who threatened to lock her in his palace for the rest of her life if she did not obey him.

The princess took refuge in the woods and came upon a lonely cottage. A light shone in the window. She was cautious as first, for it was said these woods were so dark that even the beasts feared to tread there. But she had an inner will that would not be diminished by any such forebodings.

She knocked on the door – once, twice, and a third time, until she thought no one was coming. But then the door opened and she found herself facing a solemn man dressed in plain homespun. He greeted her, and if he was surprised by her presence, it did not show. She looked into his grave eyes and asked if she might take shelter in his home for the night. He calmly agreed and ushered her inside.

What she did not know was that the cottage was truly the home of a sorcerer, disguised as a lonely spinner living in the middle of the forest. He watched the young woman cautiously that first night and gave away nothing about himself, for he had found magic to be too tempting a lure for the cruel and the wicked.

But the princess showed no signs of these. In that night, crowded before the hearth as she was, the princess proved to be kind and fascinating. The man was charmed. The next morning he offered his home to her as long as she had need of it. Fearing the reach of her father, she accepted.

They grew close as they lived together. The princess saw the spinner’s grave manner gradually give way to something tender and shy. They spent many nights talking by the fire, and when their eyes met in that flickering haze, she thought he…he…

Belle coughed. The dust was bothering her lungs more than she thought. She was dizzy – she put a hand to her forehead and felt it burning. Her gaze grew dim. She felt herself sinking into the cushions, the book slipping through her hands, and then knew no more.

She found herself in a dimly lit room with no recollection of how she arrived there. A fire was burning to her side. Belle glanced around and saw she was in a cramped cottage. There was a single room, with a ladder ascending to a tiny loft above. That must be where the resident of the cottage slept, for she saw no bed in the room.

Belle knew she ought to be afraid of finding herself in a strange place with no explanation as to how she got there, but there was something reassuring in this narrow abode. Gradually she felt herself calm as the warmth of the fire seeped into her.

She became aware of another presence in the room. They were close, just a scant foot or so away from where she sat at the hearth. As she looked, the shadow turned and leaned forward.

Belle felt a rush of warmth as their face came into view. She knew that face, recognized the careworn smile and the wrinkled eyes that shone at her in the firelight. They were like honey at this distance, but she knew they could be darker, depending on the mood of the owner.

He said something to her, though she could not make out the words. But it was in such a gentle voice, low and smooth, that ran over her aching heart like a balm. He reached forward with hands, large and strong, and she knew, just knew, that she had seen those hands. They were warm as they closed around her fingers. She had not known her hands were so cold.

Her companion spoke again. She wished she might understand what he was saying, to hear whatever sentiments he dropped in that lilting rumble of his, but her pulse was pounding in her ears and she had no wish for it to stop.

He was leaning closer now, nose almost brushing hers. Belle’s eyes fluttered closed as their lips met. She had never felt such a sweet sensation as his skin against hers. Her hands broke free of his of their own volition, and she reached for his hair instinctively. She sank her fingers into the warm curls that framed his face, and they were so, so soft.

His hands tightened in her skirt as he whimpered against her mouth. She squeezed her hands in response. He drew back and she stared up breathlessly, smiling. His answering grin was like nothing she’d seen before.

He was speaking again, and for a moment she thought she caught her name. Then she felt a pair of hands on her shoulders. But that could not be right; they were alone, and his hands were slowly reaching up to cover hers where they rested in his hair.

The warmth was fading. He was still smiling at her, but his face grew indistinct, and the whole room seemed to blur.

She awoke in the library. Someone was shaking her.

“Belle,” called that gentle rumble. “You can’t sleep like this – you’ll catch a chill.”

She struck out wildly and caught something soft in her fingers. Her eyes flew open. She found herself holding a handful of Rumplestiltskin’s hair. The wizard was standing over her, hands on her shoulders, and looking as if she might leap upon him at any moment. She’d never seen his eyes so wide.

“Sorry,” Belle said, letting his locks slip through her hand. They felt like down between her fingers.

She lowered her hands slowly. Rumplestiltskin watched her for a moment longer before releasing her shoulders and stepping back. He seemed almost shy. His eyes darted to the floor as he cleared his throat.

“No matter,” he said. He paused, lips pursed, before turning away and adding, “Tea’s getting cold.”  
“You made tea?” Belle rose from the sofa. She could feel the ghost of his fingers on her shoulders.

He made an irritated noise and glanced at her with the expression of an offended cat.

“I can make tea every now and then. I’m not as helpless as you think.”

She giggled. His lips twitched. He turned away before his face could make good on the threat of a smile.

“Thank you,” Belle said to his back.

He made a pacified sound and led the way to the stairs. Belle glanced back to the sofa. She had been sure she dropped the book on the floor when she fell asleep, but it was nowhere to be found.

Just as she made to turn away, she caught a glimpse of a faded red cover underneath a plush cushion. She looked at the retreating figure of her master and smiled. He hopped down the first step as if he meant to take them two at a time, and his fingers were whirling in rapid circles.


End file.
